by E. E. Holmes
“Ms. Simms requests that you sign these papers. It’s a privacy agreement, which stipulates that you will not disclose any information about last night’s encounter—including any pictures or other forms of media you may have used to document said encounter—and that you will agree to immediately take down any social or electronic media posts that you may have shared. We can arrange generous compensation if necessary.”
I glimpsed at Talia over the woman’s shoulder. She was sitting at a table in the corner, staring down at a small bowl of fruit as though she had absolutely no idea what she was meant to do with it. Her shoulders were stiff; I was sure she was listening to us.
My gut reaction was to shove the packet into the woman’s face and rip it in half, then whip out my phone and tweet every detail I could think of to the entire world. Instead, I took a deep breath and forced my face into a smile. “I thought everything that went on here was already secret because of Mr. Campbell’s privacy policies?”
The girl shook her head. “His policies apply specifically to organized activities and events. Your encounter with Ms. Simms falls into the category of leisure time, and therefore is not technically protected in the terms set forth in Mr. Campbell’s contracts.”
“Oh, I see…” I replied, to fill the tense space between us. Meeting Talia Simms was among the least leisurely experiences of my life, but I decided not to challenge the term. I worked to keep my smile in place and said, “Do you have a pen?”
The girl opened her mouth to unleash the second half of her speech but then, clearly taken aback, closed it again. Perhaps no one had ever agreed so readily to this kind of proposal. The woman had obviously been ready to haggle about a payoff, or else threaten me with legal action. A bit flustered, she produced a pen from her purse and held it out to me.
I took the packet and flipped through to the last page. “Is this where I sign? She doesn’t need to pay me. I’m not looking for publicity, you know. I just wanted to make sure she wasn’t… well, dead.” I signed, then handed the pen and the papers back to the assistant.
The woman blinked and then practically snatched the papers back from me, lest I change my mind. She marched back to Talia’s table, where she sat down smartly and the two of them quickly began conferring. I turned my back on them and walked over to a table bathed in the early-morning sunlight. Hannah sat down beside me, smirking.
“What?” I asked, snatching up a croissant out of a basket and taking a huge bite. It was still warm.
“That was unexpectedly diplomatic of you,” she said. “Very well played.”
I leaned forward slightly and waved my hand in a theatrical little bow. “Maybe I should be the one with the Oscar.”
Milo was paying no attention to our conversation whatsoever. He was craning his neck and gawking obnoxiously at Talia from his seat beside Hannah. “Oh my God, oh my God. She’s here, she’s actually here. Be cool, Milo, be cool,” he muttered quietly under his breath.
“It doesn’t matter whether you’re cool or not,” I told him, using our connection so no one would see me talking to thin air. “You could walk right up to her and fanboy all over her. She wouldn’t notice.”
Milo was too starstruck to retort. He just muttered something that might have been, “I bet she smells like summer rain and Beyoncé.”
I turned to Hannah, keeping my voice low. “I don’t see Grayson or any other spirits around here. Do you?”
Hannah shook her head. “No, but I’m sensing at least six or seven, though. You?”
I focused in on the familiar buzz that filled any space latent with spirit energy. For Hannah and me, this buzzing was as much part of our daily soundtracks as the wind, or cars driving by on the street, and no more alarming than a familiar song playing quietly in the background. We had learned as Apprentices to tune out this energy until we chose, consciously, to pay attention to it.
Yes, there were at least half a dozen spirits present on the porch. An emo teenager, filled with rage, spewed unheard profanities at his mother; a woman in her late sixties chastised her unwitting husband for eating too much bacon; a child complained loudly that he couldn’t eat the food and that it wasn’t fair, while his energy itself screamed, “Why won’t you look at me, mommy?” Even as I plucked their voices from the fabric of the buzzing, my fingers itched to commit their faces to paper. I couldn’t see any of them with my eyes, at least for the moment, but I could see them with the visual part of my brain—the part which crafted the images I drew with such detail and care.
Partly to calm the itching in my fingertips, I began fingering the rose quartz on my wrist. Breakfast offered the first real test of our Masking bracelets—yesterday Hannah and I had seen a spirit here or there, usually from afar, but now we had at least a half dozen spirits with us on the porch. Thankfully, the bracelets were working perfectly for the time being; Grayson had given no indication last night of his sensing my Gateway, and now, none of the spirits here with us noticed anything special about us. Not a single one materialized and started hovering around us curiously, as often happened when a spirit first detected our Gateway. We were “invisible” for the time being; it felt strange, in a way.
I didn’t know yet what Campbell was up to in luring all these wealthy people to this property, but he certainly didn’t choose them just for their money. Every single one of these people was legitimately haunted.
A blonde waitress appeared at our table, interrupting my spirit inventory. She was dressed in a uniform that made her look as if she’d stepped out of an Edwardian British drama—right down to her high, stiff collar and lace-trimmed apron. She deftly swung several platters off of her silver tray and placed them before us. They were laden with heaps of eggs, bacon, biscuits, home fries, and fruit salad. I barely allowed myself a moment’s curiosity—How many of the body-image-crazed celebrities here actually ate this kind of stuff?—before loading up my plate, grabbing a fork, and tucking in.
“You know,” I said, through a mouthful of egg, “I definitely don’t have the willpower to be a celebrity. All of my tabloid photos would be of me stuffing my face.”
“Well, stuff it quickly,” Hannah replied, “because the first communication session starts in fifteen minutes.”
§
After dining on the airy and sunlit dining porch, the drawing room seemed unnaturally dark. The curtains were all drawn; I suspected there were black-out shades behind them too, for no light crept in around the edges. A low fire crackled invitingly in the white marble fireplace, and tiny flames danced on candles that had been nestled among the bookshelves. The room ought to have been uncomfortably warm, but I could hear the hum of the air conditioning as it fought valiantly to keep things cool.
The first row of chairs was already full of rapt and waiting guests. Like us, several others had made their way to the drawing room from breakfast; most of these guests were now wandering the room, taking in the art on the walls, or else laying claim to chairs with their belongings. I took the opportunity to scan the room for anything even vaguely Durupinen related, while keeping an eye out for any hidden tech; I could find nothing.
At the front of the room, a single chair stood on a platform beside a grand piano. “Is he going to sing show tunes to the spirits?” I asked. “If he comes out in a velvet tux like one of those cruise ship performers, I’m leaving.”
Hannah shrugged. “Let’s find some seats.”
“Maybe closer to the back,” I suggested. “I want to keep both the guests and the spirits in view.”
We slid into two chairs in the back corner of the last row, leaving at least three chairs between us the other guests. At Hannah’s suggestion, Milo began to drift around the room; he had agreed that it would be a good idea for him to attempt communicating with the other “floaters.”
As Milo began his first lap, Talia entered with a wide-brimmed hat draped low over her face. She skirted a woman who tried to speak to her, and took a seat on the other side of the room, in one of the back rows; s
he immediately assumed a body language so guarded that no one else dared approach her, although several people pointed.
“I’m still not picking up on Grayson, are you?” I whispered to Hannah.
“No,” Hannah whispered back. “I’m not sensing any spirits near Talia right now.” Then through our connection, I asked Milo, “Is there anyone around Talia?”
“Nope.” He replied. “Lots of deadside cruisers here, though—and they’re all pretty eager to talk. I’ll let you know what I find out.”
Suddenly, the lights—and indeed the very flames in the hearth and on the candles themselves—dimmed to a dull glow. The crowd gasped collectively. I looked around the room and realized that every single guest at Whispering Seraph must’ve been in the room with us.
“Okay, that was weird,” I muttered, making a note to examine both the candles and the fireplace when the session was over. Surely they were gas-fueled or something like that; a flick of a switch could create instant ambiance.
An unnatural hush fell over the room as thirty or so upturned faces swiveled, in almost perfect synchronicity, to the platform at the front.
Campbell made us wait; he drew out the moments before his appearance until the anticipation built to an almost unbearable degree. The guests were kept waiting for so long that they started to speculate, in a volley of whispers, as to whether Campbell was really coming out, before vehemently shushing each other in the hopes that he might suddenly appear. This cycle repeated itself three or four times until the crowd nearly reached its breaking point.
Toward the front of the room, the spirit of an elderly gentleman, thin and spry despite his age, had begun mocking the crowd, shouting that Campbell was a coward, that he wasn’t coming at all, that the guests all should leave. It was almost impossible for Hannah and me not to giggle a bit at his antics—certainly he was being serious, but his theatrics were over the top. But in an audience this tense, we didn’t dare laugh—it would give us away in an instant.
Just when I truly thought the audience was about to give up and leave, the door behind the platform swung open and Campbell strode forth, with both arms in the air like he was freaking Evita about to address Argentinean masses. I failed to stifle a derisive laugh, but fortunately my snicker was swallowed by the crowd’s tumult; the other guests were cheering, clapping, and shrieking Campbell’s name. A few were even reaching upward, with their arms stretched wide, shouting prayers and blessings upon him.
I concentrated on stemming a rising tide of irrational panic within me; overtly devout and raucous demonstrations of faith always made me want to run for the hills. It wasn’t that I couldn’t respect religious people—even the fervently religious. The line, for me, was when the faithful began throwing their canes and crutches aside, claiming that prayer had healed them. That kind of shit scared the living daylights out of me.
Campbell showed no signs of fear, though. Indeed, his face was alight with joy; he was obviously basking in the attention. His chest expanded over and over again, as though the adulation of the crowd were oxygen.
“Ugh, just look at him,” I whispered under the din. “Is he getting off on this, or what?”
“Forget him,” Hannah said. “Look at the spirits!”
I looked around, as subtly as I could, locating the spirits; their reaction to Campbell’s appearance wasn’t nearly as universally enthusiastic. Several looked quite excited to see Campbell and were clapping and cheering along with their living companions. But a few looked quite wary. One spirit had crossed his arms defensively over his chest, with his chin jutted out defiantly. Another spirit, the angry teenager who we’d sensed at breakfast, was pointing and shouting slurs at Campbell.
“Why won’t you give them my whole message you bastard! Why are you lying to them?” the teenager shrieked over the applause.
“Whoa. The spirit contingent is quite split on Campbell, aren’t they?” I muttered in Hannah’s ear.
“Mm-hmm,” she agreed, clapping to blend in with the others.
Finally, after a thorough ego boost, Campbell put his arms up: The hush that came over the group seemed as if it had dropped onto their heads from Campbell’s open hands. The spirits, too, fell silent.
“Good morning to you all, spirit and living alike,” Campbell opened. “To some of you,” and here he took a moment to make eye contact with several different guests, while keeping his stunning smile firmly in place, “welcome back to the Sanctuary at Whispering Seraph. To others, we welcome you for the very first time.” At this, Campbell looked directly at Hannah and me. Hannah smiled shyly, nodding at the group—some of whom had turned in their seats to look at us. I flicked a hand awkwardly in acknowledgment of the attention, but dropped my eyes quickly to the floor. I had a part to play as the reluctant sister—a part for which I was well cast.
“I have such gratitude in my heart, seeing y’all here, and I’ll tell you why,” Campbell went on, with one hand clutching passionately at his crisp white linen shirt. “Because it means that I get to use this gift I’ve been blessed with. Get to use it for one more day. Get the incredible opportunity to help everyone in this room find connection and peace. There is no greater thing in this world than helping others. It’s our purpose. It’s at the core of our humanity. It’s its own reward—the only reward you or I will ever need.”
“Yeah, that and the disgusting amounts of money you squeeze from these poor, desperate people, you hypocrite,” I thought to myself; a bitter laugh from one of the spirits let me know I wasn’t the only one in the room who felt this way.
As surreptitiously as I could, I scanned the room once more. Every living audience member was positively lapping up Campbell’s bullshit. If Talia moved any closer to the edge of her seat, she’d fall off of it. Her expression was twisted with emotion, with a gleam of hope in her eyes. If I didn’t know better, I would’ve thought she were being filmed for one of her movies. There was still no trace of Grayson, despite his having been so protective the previous night. In fact, as I took a quick headcount, I realized Talia was the only person in the room who didn’t have a spirit attached to her.
My anger at Talia trickled away; my rage was sapped by seeing her tears while knowing that there was no one there beside her silently wishing to reach out and dry them. As I watched her, all I could feel was terribly sad and sorry for her.
Almost as though she’d heard this thought, Talia turned and caught me staring at her. She dragged the back of her hand angrily across her face, wiping away her tears, then glared at me before whipping her head around to face the front. She snapped her head so quickly that her hair swung around the back of her head in a single curtain, like a door slamming shut between us.
Right, okay, so maybe a little of my anger was back.
“Before I start, I want to remind everyone,” Campbell continued, in a voice saturated with regret, “that I have no control over which spirits are here and which are not. I have no control over what they say to me, or what they may choose not to say. I’m merely a conduit. I can only continue if everyone agrees to remember this.”
Fervent nods and answering cries of “Yes!” “Of course!” and “We understand!” came from the crowd.
A shiver ran down my spine: This was starting to feel more and more like a cult than a retreat. Then again, I doubted cults advertised themselves as cults—I doubted their brochures said, “Join us for relaxation, community-building, and a good brainwashing.” Milo must have picked up on my thought through our connection because I heard him stifle a snort.
“Y’all know how my gift came to me—Y’all know it isn’t really my gift at all.” Campbell went on humbly, “It belongs to my angel, who comes to me with messages from those we’ve lost. I may never know why I was chosen. But I do know this: Everyone in this room was chosen, too. We’ve found each other, and that was no accident. I don’t believe in accidents. Only Providence, do y’all understand me?”
Again came a sycophantic chorus of answers, with the audience
’s heads bowing in unison like flowers all caught in the same irresistible breeze.
I glanced at Hannah again. Her face was twisted with distaste, as if her mouth were full of something bitter. I nudged her with my foot; with a start, she quickly recomposed her expression into one of polite interest. We couldn’t let our ruse slip, no matter how badly I wanted to punch Campbell right in his too-shiny teeth.
“And Providence knows that we’re all here for a reason, so let’s get down to it. There are loved ones here who wish to speak, and I’m ready to let them be heard!” At this, Campbell threw back his head, closed his eyes, and opened his arms as if he were welcoming a dear friend.
Just like yesterday, a great dark swooping something descended over the room, like the shadow of a bird of prey. It was more than just darkness, though; for Hannah and me, the strange disorienting pressure returned. My head swam and ached, but I fought against it. I kept my face as impassive as I could as I focused all of my energy on studying the cloud thing now circling us like a hawk.
There was a rippling to the cloud, a sort of billowing motion, as though a wind none of us could feel were filling its sails. The cloud still had no defined form… no limbs, or head, or—as one might expect from a so-called angel—wings. The cloud, an amorphous blob of dense energy, shifted and flowed, finally swirling itself around Campbell; it came to rest on his shoulders.
Campbell couldn’t see his angel, that much was clear. He didn’t seem to know where it was in the room until the moment it came to rest on him. But every spirit had been following the cloud’s progress; their collective energy was buzzing through me, humming with trepidation, agitation, and fear. None of the living people in the room seemed to sense the cloud at all, however. Aside from a shiver here or there—the temperature in the room had cooled appreciably when the cloud entered—they just waited, watching Campbell intently, utterly ignorant of the paranormal, serpentine something now winding itself around their beloved guru.